Park riding on the MTBs

I've been having a rough week on the mountain bike. So far, I've had three flats--one resulting in a high-speed blowout and brusing, bloody crash. I suppose it's all part of the fun!

I rode the Edora BMX track in Fort Collins with friends Curtis and Russel Heideman a few days ago. Good times, and no major spills. Hitting the track puts a whole new perspective on the mountain bike genre; I was really stoked to jump a little bit and cannot wait to apply this experience to the alpine environment.

Two wheels, two fly rods, many mountains

I spent the last 8 days rolling around on the twisties from Colorado to British Columbia and back. My hands are still numb from the buzz of my knobby TKC 80s at 80 mph, and my heart is still starting to mellow from the jitters of riding my last few hours in a high altitude electrical lightshow. I set out last week with a loaded bike, two fly-fishing rods and a dream to catch fish across the Rockies ... instead I practiced casting and knot tying in three states and two Canadian provinces . But I can't complain--eight days in the mountains is better than 8 days not .... in the mountains :).
Here are a few of my images:

McDonald Lake at Glacier National Park, MT.

A mountain goat chillin' in the summer sun, Going to the Sun Road, Glacier, National Park.

Earthquake lake near Sandpoint, ID.

Me and my ride at Glacier in Montana

My wicked BMW R1200GS loaded and ready for mountain assault.

FitzRoy and El Chalten favs ...

It is amazing how one can fixate, anticipate, dream of, look forward to a vacation for so long, drink it in all at once, in an action-packed week (or month, if you're lucky,) and then be right back in the same funk and monotony of daily life within matter of minutes of arriving home.

We left worriless, star-filled, Fitzroy skies a few weeks ago to discover our fence had been blown down, we owe a boatlad to Uncle Sam for taxes this year and the "dynamic" excitement of my office has not let up one bit! FANTASTIC! I love it.

So, my challenge is this. How to make every day a vacation ... hmmmm.... I know, I know, retire now, live life to the fullest ... as long as I can pull it off on a few pennies a day. Yeah ... I've been thinking about it.

So, I'm still editing, examining and enjoying the myriad photos I took last month while in the mountains down south. Until I can manage the early retirement, I'm just going to keep my brain switched on vacation mode ... at least for few more weeks ... dangerous--I know--but I'm willing to take the risk.

Street dogs, overlanders, food and adventure in El Calafate, Argentina

We hung out in El Calafate several times during our trip, relaxing between backpacking adventures. The town is blowing up with tourism, with population growth of 300 percent in the past five years, there are now 20,000 residents.

We stayed at a couple of different hotels here, both within a few blocks of the main street. There were numerous restaurants, cafes, bakeries and outdoor shops. Tons of great street dogs, overland vehicles and even a big casino. Check out a few snaps from around town.

This old Citroen drove survived the Pan-American highway, 16,000 miles from Alaska to Ushuaia.


This was one of my favs, a pimped out Land Cruiser with a custom box on the back. This thing was so trick and ready for action I am considering selling our home to buy something like it! A beautiful piece of machinery.

This is a Toyota truck with a Hilux 3.0 Turbo Diesel, a sweet vehicle we cannot purchase in the U.S., unfortunately. I would buy one of these in a second, if they were available here. This one is complete with snorkel and PIAAs. Dope.

The Defender appeared to be the local favorite. I saw more Defenders in El Calafate than I'd ever seen in one spot. I spent a day rolling around the nearby estancias, near Lago Roca with a fishing guide in a Defender. We were throwing a rooster tail at 90mph on gravel roads and corner on rails in his ride ... I am glad to be alive. I think he was just trying to make up for the crappy fishing :)

I thought Kermit and the muppets were going to tumble out of this rig -- some sort of vintage Mercedes conversion bus -- ready to roll Ruta 40 to Bolivia.

This little ragamuffin scampered out of a brick shanty every time we walked buy. He was a bit shy, but liked being scratched behind the ears.


I wanted to take this guy home with me. The street dogs in El Calafate were great, plenty around to pet, all seemingly friendly and loveable.

Here I am, enjoying a delicious frozen treat at Acuarela .... our favorite ice cream shoppe in El Calafate.

Annie, snacking on yet another empanada. We could've survived on empanadas alone; they're about a buck each, fresh and hot, filled with chicken, lamb beef, etc. Yum.

Annie, me, Kat and Steve at the Libro bar. We spent five or six days on the trail in Torres del Paine, Chile, with Kat and Steve. Great folks from West Yorkshire, UK, near where my uncle Michael and Aunt Catherine live. Hopefully, they'll come visit us in Colorado soon.

Roasting lambs at the Estilo Campo Parilla. All you can eat lamb, beef and chicken for $10. You cannot beat it. Throw in a bottle of the local vino tinto, and you're good to go for about $25 for two.

More blue water ...

A group of backpackers heading toward the catamarran launch on Lago Pehoe. This was our starting point for our 5 night, 6 day trek in Torres del Paine, NP. We hiked the "W" circuit, which included the Grey Glacier, the Valle de Frances and the Torres Del Paine.

This was our view of the Cuernos del Paine (Horns of Paine) from the Catamarran at the onset of our stay at TDP. Lago Pehoe is among the bluest of the blue lakes, rivers and lagoons we splashed in while in Chile.

Big Ice, Leche de Glaciar

During our Patagonia trip, Annie and I visited many big glaciers, all part of the Southern Patagonian Icefield. The streams, rivers and lakes of Patagonia are filled with pure, azure glacial runoff. You can stick your head right in lake and start drinking. Locally, they refer to the milky blue glacial water as "leche de glaciar" or milk of the glacier, due to its milk appearance. It looks this way due to the high mineral content in the melted runoff.

In this image, Annie is hiking down the valley to the Cerro Torre glacier, where we did a trek on the ice with crampons. We hiked about 3.5 steep hours and crossed one river via Tyrolean traverse and balanced on boulders to cross another, before arriving at the glacier. It was a 12 hour day, followed by about 12 cold cervezas.

And ... here's Annie, getting ready to attack the ice, complete with crampons

This is our guide, Diego, trying to stay dry on a river traverse. The guides enjoy dunking each other on this traverse by pulling the line up and down as someone attempts to cross. It was Diego's birthday on this day, so it seemed appropriate that he should get wet. I'm sure it was all very safe and calculated ...


This is a shot of the Perito Moreno glacier, which puts on a show 24/7 for spectators, dropping thousands of tons of ice into the lake for onlookers. This photos doesn't do it justice, the wall is 80 feet high, towering over a lake filled with ice bergs. When chunks come crashing down, the valley thunders and waves of whitewater rip across the lake.

Patagonian sunrises

This is the old Refugio Pehoe on Lago Pehoe; it's now a park ranger station. I took this photo on February 14, Valentine's day, early in the morning. We'd hiked under gray skies and drizzle for about 10 hours the previous day, so wakening to blue skies was a big treat.

I caught this sunrise near our campsite in the Mt. Fitzroy region, near El Chalten, Argentina. This was literally the view out our tent door. As usual, Fitzroy was acting a bit camera shy.

This is the legendary Torres del Paine, the Towers of Paine, and the namesake of the Chilean national park. While the towers are impressive, I've always found the Cuernos del Paine, much more dramatic peaks, with their starkly constrasting black and white granite.

Anyhow, we left camp in darkness, rain and snow at 4:30 am for the opportunity to see the light show on the Torres, however they were being camera shy. This is one of the clearest shots I was able to capture on that morning. It was an amazing moment as we stood for an hour in horizontal snow, hoping for the summit to clear. The entire valley was aglow with red and orange.

Flamingos at Laguna de Nime

We flew from Ushuaia to El Calafate this morning and went for a little walk at a nearby wildlife preserve at Laguna Nime. There were birds of every color, shape and size enjoying the waters at the edge of Lago Argentina. We got fairly close to a flock of flamingos before they burst into the air, bright pink and black wings against the bluest waters. The photo doesn't do them much justice. I'm quickly learning that this place is far beyond any photo--impossible to capture in two dimensions.

El fin del mundo, Ushuaia

I had my first sips of mate on Friday while exploring the Beagle Channel on a small boat Friday afternoon. Despite clouds and drizzly weather, we opted to take our chances and see what we could. We hopped on the "Che" con Capitan Leo for a four-hour tour. We had a great time, saw plenty of Sea Lions and comorants. Our crew was big fans of Manu Chao, so we rocked out for awhile, sipping hefeweizen on tap and enjoying the wet (and surprisingly wind-less) weather.

On Saturday we explored Tierra del Fuego national park and hiked about 8 miles through beautiful forests along the beaches of the Bahia de Lapatia. The area was stunning, thick forests running all the way to the cobalt blue waters and surrounded by massive peaks.

Mas tango y La Boca

Here are a few more shots from the La Boca barrio we visited on Wednesday. More of the tango dancers and a few shots of this colorful neighborhood. We've been eating up a storm so far on this trip, so we're looking forward to some outdoor activity once we head wayyyy south tomorrow to cooler temps in Ushuia.

If you're interested in dining details, check out Annie's words and photos on all the yummy food at patagoniawino.blogspot.com ... Gotta go eat ... Ciao, ciao

Tango en La Boca

We endured several deadly cab rides across Buenos Aires today for a few hours strolling the vibrant alleys of La Boca. Street tango, a rainbow of corrugated aluminum and empenadas were on the menu.

Chillin in the heat: Buenos Aires

We arrived in BA this morning and promptly made our way to the pool at the Home Hotel in Palermo Viejo. The neighborhood is gushing with the signature porteno chic flavor we were looking for--plenty of world class dining and drinking, modern and classic architecture and Argentine hospitality.

The pool and courtyard was a great spot to relax and enjoy a few Quilmes (Argentine cerveza), while we waited for our room to be prepped. After a few hours of semi-lucid relaxation, we visited the Lobby Vinoteca for a few glasses of vino tinto and a four-course lunch. Mmmmmmm. Then a four-hour siesta ....

More Good Times at OR with the KAVU crew

The world is flat my friends--this is true. While at OR last week we had some time to hang with our bros at Kavu. Seth Warren was running around with his camera and took this great shot while we were all hanging at Murphy's. Within about ten minutes of Seth's blog post, our EVP Gary Imig, was running around the office, laptop in hand, showing everyone the photo ... I wonder how long it'll take for him to find this one!!!
That's me and Barry Barr up front, in the back row you'll see Tera Linafelter, Tim Sharkey and Jeremiah Mackmiller--all critical members of the Sierra Trading Post buying and marketing staff. Next time, we'll make sure Gary gets in the photo! :) Cheers!

Good times at Outdoor Retailer

I spent a few days last week roaming the Salt Palace convention center in Salt Lake for the 2008 winter Outdoor Retailer tradeshow. While there, we witnessed the building across the street from the convention center, formerly DV8 nightclub, burn to the ground--quite a spectacle. When I first noticed the plume of black smoke, I thought someone had left a bagel in the toaster over at the Mormon Temple -- no such luck.
Anyhow, it was great to be at the show, see all of the new and innovative gear for 2008, and to catch up with friends. I've been attending this tradeshow for 10 years now, and after awhile the "Wow" factor slows down a bit. However, there's always something there that excites me enough that I can't leave the show without one in my possession. This year, I came home with two new items, and I'm excited to use both on our upcoming trip.

1. Steripen Adventure: If you've ever experienced the joy of Giardia or amoebic dysentery, then you'll want to own a Steripen. This gadget, about the size of a good Cuban pyramide, purifies questionable drinking water in a few minutes using ultraviolet radiation. Just hit the switch, dip it in your Nalgene, wait a few minutes and the green light will indicate when it's safe to gulp. The technology has been available for a few years now, but the new Adventurer and Traveler models are smaller and lighter.

2. Next up is the Chockstone Primaloft jacket from Sierra Designs. A great all around, compressible, insulated jacket with a sweet, hood. It's got thumb thongs, packs into its own pocket, the hood cinches down so it wraps your head like a do-rag. AND it's even waterproof breathable, thanks to the Drizone membrane. I'm really excited to wear this jacket for penguin hunting in rainy Tierra del Fuego next week :)I think we're good to go on equipment for the trip--maybe we're even over the top--but that's how we roll. It's hard not to overdo it when you've worked for an outdoor gear retailer for nine years. We're counting the hours to departure at this point, starving ourselves in anticipation of Buenos Aires meals, and watching the weather forecasts from BA to Ushuaia!!!

Patagonia countdown :)

We're only a few weeks out from departure on our wild Patagonian adventure after a solid six weeks of planning. I've been reading the final pages of Bruce Chatwin's In Patagonia, perhaps the coolest travel tale ever written ... except for Kerouac's On the Road. Annie is brushing up on her Espanol skills as I type, the flights are dialed in, most of our lodging is reserved and our staging area in the basement is overflowing with a rainbow of ripstop and cordura.Our loose itinerary is as follows.

• Fly to Buenos Aires for a few days of the cosmo life in Palermo Viejo. Vino rojo y parilla y asado ... lots of grass fed Argentine beef ....


• Dump the stylish urban comforts, and fly to the end of world, Ushuaia, Tierra Del Fuego to gorge ourselves on centolla, the southern king crab.


• North to El Calafate to recover from the crab coma with few days of relaxing and fly fishing


• Chase rheas, guanacos, flamingos and penguins hoping to capture just a few great images.


• South to Chile to explore Torres Del Paine national park near Puerto Natales.


• North to El Calafate, then further north to El Chalten to explore the Los Glaciares NP and trek in the shadows of Cerro Torre and Mt. FitzRoy


• Question the meaning of life and consider throwing it all away for a life of guiding tourists in a small South American mountain town ...


• Fish, mountain bike, hike, drink mate ... relax


• Head back to reality in Colorado :)